Operations Management vs Leadership

Who is this article for?

Organization leaders and ops managers in need of role and responsibility clarity, and resources to optimize their organization.

Topics Covered in This Article:

Operations
Operation Skills
Operation Resources and Tools
Leadership
Leadership Skills

To effectively manage and guide a nonprofit organization, it is essential to strike a harmonious balance between efficient systems and processes while being adaptable to the ever-changing and limited availability of human resources.

Everyone must understand their roles and responsibilities, whether your team consists of a small group of three individuals or a larger organization of 50 or more. Equipping them with the necessary resources and tools for internal communication and execution is equally important. The operations function is vital in supporting these team members and ensuring that all achieve the set goals, while leadership provides guidance and direction to drive the organization forward.

This discussion will explore the fundamental distinctions between leadership and operations management and the skills and resources necessary to succeed in each domain.

Operations

Operations are about transforming inputs into outputs, supporting an organization’s different departments (HR, recruiting, finance), and ensuring that the creation and execution of a service’s value go smoothly.

Operations management (ops management) involves optimizing the different processes and flows of resources in an organization. People in ops management are in charge of planning, organizing, supervising, and maintaining many systems. They notice the different bottlenecks in the organization's workflows and determine how to resolve them.

Working more behind the scenes, operations managers help maximize the productivity of others in the organization by building scalable systems and keeping the organization functioning at a high level. Ops management enables people to focus on their core tasks and work towards the organization's goals.

While ops management shares some crossover with project management, their scope is broader and ongoing. Operations management is done continuously, versus project management, which has specific start and end dates, a defined scope of work, and specified resources. Ops managers are responsible for budgeting, planning, auditing, and compliance, while project management is responsible for ensuring the execution and update of compliant regulations within a project is carried out.

Operation Skills

Although operations and ops management can be utilized in different departments within an organization, below are common skills and capabilities that aid in the success of these roles. You may use these as baseline qualities and traits to look for in effective Operations managers to COOs.

Optimization-focused - The ability to understand the goal and decide whether current processes and solutions are a fit. An ops manager needs to look at the big picture and determine whether the systems are working towards the organization’s goals and working efficiently.
Detail-orientedness - The ability to pay close attention to small elements and ensure accuracy and precision in tasks and processes. Details and context matter in this line of work. Knowing the nitty-gritty can help increase the efficiency of systems and spot friction points before they become a more significant issue.
Technical knowledge - Basic understanding of statistics, sampling and process analysis, and data analysis. Data and analysis are critical to optimizing the organization’s systems.
Systems thinking and prioritization - Ability to quantify trade-offs quickly across organizational processes and workflows. There may be several systems that need attention, and knowing which to give attention to and when is vital in keeping things moving and preventing bottlenecks or project delays.
Precise communication skills - Ability to convey object-level information accurately, clearly, and effectively, using concise and specific language. Although the day-to-day may be overseeing systems and processes, people execute and work within those systems for them to succeed. Therefore, clear communication is not just a recommendation but necessary to ensure an organization’s team is supported, efficient, effective, and working at the highest level.

Operation Resources and Tools

Operations management involves optimizing processes and systems within an organization. For an organization to work most effectively, it needs tools and resources to support and integrate into their day-to-day.

Below is a list of tools and resources categorized by function. Although we have no affiliation or benefit with any company below, these are the most common tools utilized for each category, most of which we’ve personally found success with or helped other organizations incorporate.

Anti Entropy is creating some organizational tool templates with how-to-use guidelines that organizations can use quickly. We will be adding them to this article upon completion.

Communication Tools
For an organization to effectively communicate internally, you need tools that foster quick communication turnaround for simple solutions and communication tools for more in-depth collaboration and discussion when needed. You must set company expectations for communicating within each tool to ensure a positive, inclusive, and productive culture.

CRM - Customer Reputation Management
A CRM is essential for managing customers (clients, donors, etc.), as it keeps all historical data in one centralized location. A CRM will not only help segment your customers at their various stages within your organization or a project but also allow your team to better anticipate needs and future requests by integrating other tools, task automation, and aid in forecasting and scaling.

Trello

Automation Tools
These tools remove the manual input and redundancy of tasks done regularly and save time and effort by automating various steps within a set workflow. You can do this for a simple task or a complicated workflow process. Automation gives your organization valuable time to focus on higher-impact items while keeping everyone on task and projects moving forward.

Zapier

Project Management
Project management is not simply a tool but a wholly separate role (and often a separate department within a larger organization). When a team has a clear, organized plan, deliverables, and target dates - the team operates at a higher level, eliminating confusion on responsibilities, timelines, and task details. Project management tools will keep your team on task, and from a systems view, allow the operations team to see where there are bottlenecks within the workflow, which teammates and projects are most efficient, and what needs to be optimized to be more effective.

HR
Human Resource Management Systems centralize company documents like employee handbooks and will streamline the onboarding and training employees and new hires. Even if you don’t need a whole HR system yet, your organization should create an employee handbook with key policies to establish a clear culture and protocol.

Accounting
An accounting tool cannot only aid in error reduction through automation and record keeping but also generate financial reports to aid in forecasting and streamlining tax filing.

Xero

Document Management
This will allow your organization to capture, store, and track digital documents for easier collaboration, workflow, and higher data security. Most document management systems also help reduce storage space, including archiving and easy recovery.

Many software companies offer discounts to nonprofit organizations. See our list of software discounts here.

Leadership

An organization’s leadership creates positive, non-incremental change through planning and strategy. They invest much effort into accomplishing the organization’s vision and motivating others to contribute to its success. They set pathways for organizational growth and draw out the best in individuals towards a common goal or purpose.

A key difference between leadership and ops management is that leaders focus not as much on the day-to-day but on the future and capitalize on opportunities for the organization, casting vision to guide change. On the other hand, operations management seeks explicitly to achieve goals through implementing and optimizing systems within an organization.

Leadership Skills

Below are common skills and capabilities that aid in the success of someone in a leadership role. You may use these as baseline qualities and traits to look for in founders, executive directors, CEOs.

Galvanizing Communication - Effectively and passionately communicating a message or idea in a way that inspires, motivates, and energizes others. Leaders must be able to clearly convey the mission of the organization and explain how processes, systems, goals, and strategies accumulate towards accomplishing the vision. They also need to ensure open lines of communication to promote a comfortable working environment.
Adaptability & learning agility - Ability to adjust, modify, or change one's approach, behavior, or mindset in response to new or changing circumstances. The landscape is ever-changing. Therefore leaders must be flexible and quick to adapt where necessary. They must be able to quickly manage unexpected events and scenarios while running the organization, be open to feedback and suggestions, and incorporate new information into their thinking quickly.
Decision-making and critical thinking - Ability to harness logical reasoning, data analysis, and the ability to assess the potential consequences of different choices. Leaders need to have a high level of comfort to explore non-traditional approaches when identifying solutions or strategies while having the courage to make well-thought out and informed decisions under uncertainty that can lead the company to accomplish its goals and vision.
Conflict management - Identifying, addressing, and resolving conflicts or disagreements that arise within an organization or between individuals or groups. Running organizations inevitable involve disagreements between staff on key decisions. Leaders must be able to reconcile these differences between members in the pursuit of the organization's goals. Leaders are also responsible for contributing to a company’s positive work environment, which can encourage team members to be more productive and motivated to do the work.
Relationship building - Establishing and nurturing connections, rapport, and trust with others. Leaders must be able build and maintain a strong and collaborative team of individuals working towards a common goal or vision. This requires investing time and effort to cultivate connections and establish a solid foundation of trust.
Ability to teach and mentor - Being able to effectively impart knowledge, provide guidance, and support the growth and development of others. Besides leading an organization, people in these positions should also be open and willing to help employees grow and see how any learning or development initiatives can make the team more successful.
Influence - Ability to affect or persuade others' thoughts, attitudes, behaviors, or decisions. It’s not enough for leaders to communicate the organization’s vision and goals. They must gain buy-in and inspire people to act. This is implemented through various means, such as logical reasoning, emotional appeals, storytelling, negotiation, and social proof. It is an essential skill for leaders, managers, and anyone seeking to drive change, build consensus, or inspire others towards a common goal.

Whether you are a recently funded org or a more prominent established non-profit, maximizing your human resources for the most significant impact is vital.

When your team is smaller, it is easy to stretch your team member's bandwidths by multiplying roles and responsibilities on each individual. However, while this is common and financially necessary, it impedes impact and scalability.

A great ops manager needs to be in the day-to-day, working to improve the systems and processes and aiding the individuals that work those systems. If your org is a ship, your ops leader manages the deck crew, while the org leader (CEO, Founder) is best suited to captain the boat and keep it on course.

Asking anyone to take on multiple roles requiring constant shifts in their core responsibilities is difficult for a seasoned veteran, much more for a growing organization. Take the time to understand your org's most urgent needs from a personnel and leadership standpoint and the future needs to scale and grow.